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What I am looking for is information on how and what to diagnose, I am ok with a dvm and screwdriver.
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Regarding the diy cans, I think there was a discussion on those fairly recently and the consensus was 'not a good idea', but do a forum search if you want to read it all.
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The discussion on diy cans is mentioned in the above thread that I just posted.
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Just gone through that forum and I don?t think I will try myself, it seems to be fraught with danger. The other info has given me some things to try though.
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Oh boy, where to start?
Firstly, if the light on the switch doesn't come on, then on early vauxhalls that usually means it has no gas in it. No gas = leak. So have a go at pressing one of the service valves to see if anything substantial comes out. If you just get a puff (or nothing), then there's your problem. Where the leak is on a 12 year old car is anyones guess, but the usual suspects are the condensor, evaporator or compressor front seal. This is probably the reason why it had a conversion done before. You can try putting some compressed air in it to see if you can see/hear a leak, try some washing up liquid and water as a bubble spray as well around the suspect areas. Don't try running it with air in it though. If it's had dye in it, then this will probably have dissapeared long ago.
Bottom line is, it's going to cost a reasonable bit of money to fix, as any of the components mentioned will cost a least a few hundred, plus it will need a new accumulator/drier in any case, plus labour and recharging. If you do get it running, then you may well find the next weakest link in the (old) chain and so on.
I don't know how much the DIY kits are, but I guess you could try one to at least get some pressure in the system. But as mentioned before, it will still have a leak so you may not be much further down the road anyway.
Where are you in the country, there may be someone near who can put a bit of dry nitrogen in it to see if it pours out somewhere. Shouldn't cost much, but not many guys have the nitrogen kit.
Generally though, it's usually a non-starter as even minor repairs and a recharge will be more than the cars worth, with no guarantee of reasonable life expectancy.
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Thanks for all the help, what I think I will do is as suggested, test the pressure at the service point, if none then I will chance one of the kits from eBay for 20 quid, if there is some pressure I will check the electrics more thoroughly and see what happens. I will post the outcome either way.
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